I am Lithuanian; Lithuania<->Taiwan<->PRC conflict is frequently a topic of discussion these days among my peers.<p>My position, shared by a few others, is that this is the next best thing that happened in Lithuania after leaving USSR: the first being joining NATO and EU in 2004.<p>Everyone in the world can (and almost everyone do) endorse PRC. "You won't get fired for picking IBM/Oracle/PRC". While very few countries have the guts and the internal political structure that allows opening a Taiwanese representative office. Lithuania shows that it prefers dealing with a country that takes the human rights into account; being the first one "in the party" to do so bring us significant advantages. Both Taiwanese investments and Lithuanian exports to Taiwan are picking up pace.<p>This will hurt us in the short-term, sure. It already does: packages(/containers) from PRC are delayed or cancelled, invoices are not being paid, we are losing business there. In the long term, if we don't change our mind (not impossible), I think this is for the better.
A Lithuanian here<p>Moral questions aside (as everyone here seems to focus on it), the people are split into roughly three camps:
- Anti-vaxers: hate anything government because Vax-Pass, including the China oriented diplomacy
- Libtards: love anything government and worship the leader of the main party. They celebrate this and openly bash China because their Leader said that it is good
- Non-involved people - worry about the economic consequences to businesses and people's lives. Most of them would have a hard time finding Taiwan (probably even China) on a blank map.<p>In my opinion:<p>Our Minister of Foreign Affairs went into this without really understanding what it would mean to the CCP and what possible counter-actions they can take. Lithuania was hit more than the politicians expected and we are, essentially, alone in this fight (save for endorsements and pats on the back). I guess that we will be in a pretty rough spot in short-term, while mid/long term can go either way depending on how the western powers and Taiwan will act.
I think the right response to these provocations is to assist Taiwan in protecting itself. Essentially we should reverse the betrayal of Taiwan by Nixon in 1972, when he withdrew the US nuclear presence there. This time, to protect from changing political winds, the nukes should be under the control of Taiwan.<p>Nothing much else will deter China.
I feel it amused that people here are discussing what and how Lithuania and the west can do to 'confront' China, but everyone in east Asia knows that before the next Taiwan election in 2024, China will do something to achieve some sort of reunification, either by forcing the Taiwanese government back to the old One-China promise (which is unlikely because the pro-China KMT lost power long ago) or by toppling the pro-independence DPP government.<p>And you people are seriously discussing the possibility that Taiwan goes nuclear, but it was in the KMT era after China had the bomb, Taiwan was considering building its own nuclear weapon, only to be quickly removed by the US. You do not need to be a rocket scientist to realize that the US has been selling Taiwan expensive out-of-date weapons, which is only logical if the US doesn't want Taiwan to defend itself. Taiwanese people know that, ever since the 70s when Taiwan was kicked off the UN and the US did nothing!<p>Do you guys know the real sentiment in Taiwan? They are more like, "F*k the US, they treat us like pawns. F*k the west, they would give us anything but real support! F*k the government, they got us in such a bad position. F*k China, they want to annex us. F*k the 20% Taiwanese, they do business with China, in China, for China!"
I find it satisfying that while the so-called super powers routinely either turn a blind eye or pay lip service or worse, bend over backwards to accommodate China's bullying behaviour, of all the mighty countries, Lithuania showed some spine (irrespective of whether the reasons were based on principles or something else).
China has already started pressuring companies with manufacturing in China such as Continental, that they should get out of Lithuania or risk losing access to the Chinese market.<p>This just goes to show one thing: western companies have to leave the Chinese market and all its money <i>on the table</i>. Unless you are ready to live under constant threat of political pressure/blackmail, risk being spied on, forced to censorship or forced to corruption, you can’t operate there (and obviously several other countries).<p>The correct move for both companies and corporations is to be open from the beginning. Open about what you think about Taiwan, about Chinese politics and so on. If that leaves you in the cold - at least you aren’t already neck deep in investment in China.<p>I don’t pity corporations that invest in China only to find themselves blackmailed into (say) having their maps app show Taiwan as a part of China. I wish more companies had the moral backbone to say “we’re going to annoy China by showing the correct world map starting in may, and if you don’t agree you should sell your stock now”.
China can get away with their diplomatic isolation of Taiwan due to the large economic power imbalance between the two.<p>We never saw this with North /South Korea, nor West/East Germany. Countries recognized both as sovereign. There was no "Korean Seoul" or "German Bonn" competing at the Olympics, etc.<p>If anything, West Germany or South Korea could've done what China is doing now but they chose not to.
My take on the whole China issue is this: no country actually cares about humans rights or any of that stuff but only about their national self interests and that most people do not actually care about humans rights, but only about their own personal self interests.<p>China is a rising power in the world and wants to at least be the primary power in its region (maybe the world, who knows), and the USA as the primary power in the world and the region wants to keep its position. The US and China also have a symbiotic relationship, China would not be able to be in the position it is today if not for American purchases, and Americans would not have the quality of life they currently enjoy if they did not have Chinese manufacturing.<p>Both countries know they cannot be openly hostile to each-other without huge ramifications so they use proxy conflicts to try to secretly bludgeon each other and propagandize their own populations. Americans can propagandize their population with HK, Taiwan, concentration camps, no freedom and Chinese can propagandize their population with drone strikes, Century of humiliation, US Imperialism... Nobody, except the misled population (who are being propagandized) or extremely dim-witted subsets of elites (who are doing the propaganda, and go high of their own supply so to say) actually care about these issues.<p>I do not think this will be as hot as the last cold war since the US and China are way more interdependent than the US and the USSR and the way to make sure that this semi-cold war will not turn into a hot war is to not trying to break the interdependence, but to strengthen it.
There is a simple solution. If most of western world allowed Taiwan embassies China would have to relent. They can't afford having entire western world stand against them.<p>Unfortunately, that would require western nations to agree on something.
As a Lithuanian, I have mixed feelings about this. From one side, I applaud my country for standing up to China. However, the rest of the EU seems to not be supporting us in taking strong position against China. This makes it easy for China to retaliate against Lithuania.<p>The real issue, in my opinion, is that the EU and the rest of the world depend heavily on China for manufacturing goods. There is that great initiative in the EU to invest in the semiconductor industry so that we would manufacture them in the EU.
Lithuanian here.<p>The situation in our country is very strange. I haven't seen so much chaos. This pro-USA anti-CCP propaganda is hurting us practically a lot.<p>Current situation in Lithuania:<p>-We have a big real-estate price boom, because people are putting all of their savings to real-estate, because money is losing value due to USA recently printing ludicrous amounts of money. Housing market is getting crazy.<p>-Prices of imported products are also going up because of the supply shortages in the market. Let's face it - Europe is dependent on China. A lot. And if only Lithuania take a stance against it, only we are going to take the hits.<p>-wages are increasing, but not as much as prices are going up.<p>For me it seems that the only ones that are getting the benefits for these anti-CCP stunts are the politicians and their groupies, who are getting patted on the back by USA, other ideologists and pro-"Lansbergis" (our foreign ministers grandfathers cult) people.<p>Me and my dad have a small business importing high-quality electrical products from China (yes China sells good products too. We tested them in laboratories). This political tension is not good. We are considering options to import not to Lithuania, but to Poland instead
On Taiwan: the more the Chinese government talks publicy about it, the more is clear they can’t/not able to do so imo. It’s just ccp propaganda, you dont announce out loud military plans
China would be much better off if they just gave up on the whole Taiwan charade. I understand how badly they want to put Taiwan under thumb like they did HK, but Taiwan is really the only issue I foresee with potential to derail China's progress.
Kind of background information on the topic: <a href="https://www.lse.ac.uk/ideas/podcasts/chinas-foreign-policy-in-central-europe" rel="nofollow">https://www.lse.ac.uk/ideas/podcasts/chinas-foreign-policy-i...</a>
> In November China unilaterally declared that each country’s respective embassy would be demoted to an office headed by a chargé d’affaires, or caretaker.<p>Is this technically an invasion from China since the embassy grounds are theoretically soil of the embassy's country?
Me speculation is Lithuania is ‘taking one for the team’ (EU) and doing what others are reluctant to. Any benefits from Taiwan - lithuania engagement will spill over to the block I guess. Kudos to them nevertheless
Lithuanian here too. I'm 100% certain PRC will try to inflict as much pain on my own country via some side pressure to larger companies that have footprint in the country or by pressing applying political pressure to other countries. Some say we just do what the US tell us. The others say we should shut up and know our place. But the reality is that this isn't Nazi Germany v2. It's a country that is unparallel in population. It also has tons of money and also capability to manufacture virtually anything. It also has so many people in concentration camps that the world just can't continue to ignore for the sake of having cheap pair of shoes. It's a bully. It won't stop with a little country in Baltics.
China has had only one leader who was educated in the West: Deng Xiaoping. Deng was sent to Paris in 1920 when he was 16 where he attented middle schools, in 1926 he studied in Moscow. He moved back to China in 1927.<p>Deng understood the West and was able to advance Chinese interests. Xi Jinping is complete opposite of Deng. Xi has no understanding of other cultures.<p>Russia under Putin bullies and plays brinkmanship due to political weakness. That seems to work for them under the circumstances.<p>Chine under Xi bullies because they are incompetent. China under Xi can't even bully right. Wolf Warrior tactics of Chinese diplomats works against Chinese interest. Nobody is scared and everyone wants to resist.
1. Beijing rejects being merely the "workshop" of the unipolar world, embraces sovereignty (GFW), high quality development (HSR), technological innovation (4IR), including in the military space (space, cyber, hypersonics). Oh and BRI.<p>2. Washington doesn't like that because it will displace the unipolar moment. USA has been in economic decline for half a century while PRC has been on a dramatic rise. Washington tries to break up PRC like it's a too-big company, via hybrid warfare. It tries everything possible to politically destabilize Beijing, with propaganda being a cornerstone.<p>3. Washington enlists anyone available to achieve this goal, including washed-up NBA benchwarmers and irrelevant Eastern European countries. They are encouraged to adopt a foreign policy that is in line with Washington's desire to preserve unipolarity and therefore hostile to Beijing. Who knows what they get in return, because it certainly doesn't make any economic sense in the long-term.<p>4. When Beijing responds tit-for-tat, answering sanctions with sanctions, harassment with harassment, downgrade in relations with downgrade in relations, it's a simple matter of spinning PRC as the aggressor who acted first.<p>Alternatively, "See See Pee Bad". Propaganda works and no one is immune.
Ideology is important and if they truly believe in this fight, more power to them. But it's not easy being a battering ram for somebody else, which seems like the more probable case.
Hope this Russian-Ukraine tensions, also China-Taiwan tensions will open eyes of western world like it happened with Europe during WWII.<p>Collapse of Soviet Union influenced western world badly. They relaxed and eased requirements whom to work with.<p>We need at least to introduce tyranny tax, same as carbon tax. That will give a good boost of local economies also gives a proper signal to the entire world.
My Grandmother just turned 100 and grew up under the Nazi regime which controlled her island in Norway. All of her grandchildren would occasionally tease her about her staunch refusal to buy anything made in China due to their politics (to this day). I find it interesting that she may have been forward thinking about this.
To me, the story of China and Taiwan sounds strange.<p>It's like if the confederates lost the war, but simply kept Florida or if Nazi Germany lost, but kept Austria.<p>I don't know how bad the Chinese nazionalists were back in the days, but I can kinda understand why the rest of China is unhappy about them.
Europeans were quick to scorn Mr Trump’s policies but the reality is that China has been unfair in its trade practices. Also, losing liberty in Hong Kong was sad but it will be much worse if free Taiwan is crushed by CCP ambition. The West should have alot of introspection about which battles are the right ones to choose.
How will history judge the current leadership of the West if they abandon Taiwan?
> packages(/containers) from PRC are delayed or cancelled, invoices are not being paid, we are losing business there<p>I think the whole western world should stop playing games with the bully state that is PRC.
Here is a perspective on China's current aggressiveness: those in power are from the culture-revolution age(1966-1976), which means they did not get good education(if anything at all). Most of them are not even middle-school graduates. Their youth time are filled with beating those well educated ones based on ideologies accusations.<p>Xi himself did not even finish middle school, his professional skill is the worst comparing to his past peers, he could not even read correctly many times in public since he came in power.
> But the Baltic republic points to its long history of standing up to bullying foreigners, including Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union<p>Not sure about that. Against Soviet Union surely, but Nazis not at all.
Why "evacuate"? Were the safety of the embassy's staff under threat?<p>I can't help but wonder if the word was deliberately chosen for click-baiting --- the only three occurrences of "evacuate/evacuation", including the one in the title, are concentrated in the second and third paragraphs --- it is as if they are injected as a last-minute after-thought.